There was nothing Evers could do to get it back to the $84.2 billion he wanted to spend. However, he certainly was not going to sign the Republicans’ budget without making some changes. Here’s what Evers did and did not do in his 78 line-item vetoes. Read More Veto Day Analysis
With any state budget, you win some, you lose some. The budget passed this week by the Republican-controlled Legislature may well have produced a record number of winners and losers — some landing in both categories. Read More Winners And Losers In The 2019-21 State Budget
By M.D. Kittle — Different day, same result. The Republican-controlled Senate passed the $83.6 billion biennial budget Wednesday, a day after their colleagues in the Assembly did the same. Read More Senate Republicans Narrowly Pass Budget, Evers And His Veto Pen Await
By M.D. Kittle and Ola Lisowski – When is an $81.7 billion biennial budget “table scraps?” Crumbs? In the bizarro world of legislative liberals, of course. The Republican-controlled Assembly on a party-line vote Tuesday passed a budget (all-funds) that is 7 percent bigger than the 2017-19 budget, set to end Sunday. The bill now heads to the Senate floor on Wednesday for debate and a vote, and then, should it pass, to Gov. Tony Evers. The Democrat has yet to say whether he’ll partially veto the bill, or strike the entire document. Read More Republican-Led Assembly Passes $83.6 Billion Budget, Dems Call It ‘Crumbs’
This week, Dan O’Donnell writes that without the fiscal father figure of former Gov. Scott Walker, legislative Republicans are throwing a big-spending house party. Read More Home Alone
At a Joint Finance executive session last week, Rep. Chris Taylor mocked the notion that subsidized Obamacare plans could possibly be affordable. Her comments were an effort to justify the expansion of Medicaid to a population between 100-138 percent of the federal poverty level that already has access to affordable, private sector health insurance thanks to existing taxpayer subsidies. Read More Rep. Taylor, Democrats Mock The Obamacare Exchange And The Affordability Of ACA Health Insurance
By M.D. Kittle – Republicans on the Legislature’s budget-writing committee upped the ante Tuesday on Health and Welfare spending, proposing a huge increases in a litany of government programs and initiatives. Read More GOP-Led Finance Committee Passes Hefty Health Services Budget — With No Medicaid Expansion
By M.D. Kittle – Gov. Tony Evers calls his rate increase for Wisconsin nursing homes the largest in over a decade. But a closer look at the numbers shows Evers’ proposed 2.5 percent general rate increase for nursing homes isn’t technically even the largest funding jump in the past three years. Read More Advocate: Evers’ Nursing Home Budget Increase Doesn’t Add Up
By M.D. Kittle – Wording changes to the “Residency Verification” section of the state’s FoodShare handbook appears to take the teeth out of laws designed to prevent public benefit fraud and to protect taxpayers. Read More Opening The Door To FoodShare Fraud? DHS Handbook Changes Raise Red Flags
By M.D. Kittle – In blasting Republicans on Thursday for axing Medicaid expansion from Gov. Tony Evers’ budget proposal, Democrats on the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee showed their hand again. The massive spending plan is built on a house of cards, with “free” federal Medicaid money as its wobbly foundation. Read More Republican-Led Budget Committee Cuts Evers’ Medicaid Expansion Plan